Happy new year, kids!
Second COVID new year. Joy.
Remember, resolutions are for suckers. Do what you want, when you want. You don't have to wait for the first of the year. Unless you're starting a new fancy planner. Then you kind of do. That's the way planners work.
We all know the old adage about it being better to give than to receive. We get it shoved down our throats when we're kids in an attempt to keep us from becoming present-crazed little shits. While I understand it's meant to present a certain enlightened point of view, I'm not sure it's accurate.
No, I'm not arguing the opposite. I think we can all agree that being a present-crazed little and/or big shit isn't cool.
I just think that there's equal joy to be had in both giving and receiving. I really, really like giving people presents. I like curating the gifts to their recipients and watching said recipients get excited when they see what I've given them. I'm doing a lot of giving now, obviously, since it's nearly Christmas. I had little somethings for all my Pleasant Hill dance friends, and took great joy in swanning 'round the place playing Christmas Fairy and handing out flower hair barrettes and bottles of wine (To the grown ups, not the small humans!) and the odd 'proper present' to people like my pal P.V. I passed around novelty soaps with silly names at the office because I knew we could all use a giggle. I find it especially gratifying when people get extra excited because they weren't expecting anything at all. And it's especially especially gratifying when you become The Coolest Grown-Up, and an eleven-year-old you've given a reversible plushie to goes out the dance studio door saying, "I'm going to tell everyone my best friend gave it to me!"
Be still, my beating heart! Right in the feels.
But the flip side is true, too. When someone has spent the time and brain cells to obtain something they think you'll enjoy...that's a lovely feeling.
Even when the things in question are tea towels that you needed. And they're sweary. Or suggestive. Or possibly violent.
Sorry, y'all, but I'm taking the week off. Work is frantic at the moment, we're in "rat hospice" mode with Maggie, and there's been a death in the extended family, so I'm a bit overwhelmed.
Take care of each other, and I'll see you next week. ❤
He's gone.
But as long as we remember, his legacy will remain with us.
Official RSC Press Release Announcing the Death of Sir Antony Sher
Tributes from Colleagues and Friends
The light has dimmed.
But it hasn't gone out.
Not completely.
And when the initial haze of grief has lifted and we're ready to stoke the fire again, it will blaze all the brighter in his memory.
I realize it's to be expected, what with the passage of time and all, but I'll be damned if the celebrity deaths aren't starting to hit closer and closer to home. We lost Stephen Sondheim last week. He was 91. He gave us stories we can treasure forever, and his light will continue to shine as long as his work is performed.
Doesn't mean I'm not still bummed, though.
I could wax poetic about the exhilaration that the challenge of Sondheim's music presented to the performer. I could wax poetic about the texture and depth of his stories and characters. I could wax poetic about how he managed to weave philosophy and empathy and social themes and all manner of life-reflected-in-art motifs throughout his works.
But I think that maybe, instead, I'll let his work do the...well, work. These are a handful of my favorites--you'll notice a bias for performances by Bernadette Peters, sorry not sorry. Some have video, some are just the album cover and the audio, but you get the idea.
Children Will Listen (Okay, so this one is a medley of Sondheim and Rodgers/Hammerstein's You've Got to be Carefully Taught, but it works, m'kay?)
The Witch's Rap/Greens, Greens
You Could Drive A Person Crazy
"Sometimes people leave you
Halfway through the wood
Do not let it grieve you
No one leaves for good
You are not alone
No one is alone"
Godspeed, Mr. Sondheim.
